Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Date of Award

12-1-2025

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

M.S. in Engineering Science

First Advisor

Yiwei Han

Second Advisor

Shan Jiang

Third Advisor

Tejas Pandya

School

University of Mississippi

Relational Format

dissertation/thesis

Abstract

Micro spherical particles have been widely applied to magnetic-based soft robotic. Due to the high impact speed and conventional substrate, spherical particles are very challenging to be printed. In this study, we integrated Electrohydrodynamic (EHD) printing and mineral oil-based bath materials to develop a novel embedded EHD printing to direct print polydimethylsiloxane-iron (PDMS-Fe) micro-particles with near perfect spherical shape. The comparison between conventional EHD and embedded EHD printing shows that the bath material can enhance the electric field confinement, which significantly lower the required printing voltage. A study has been carried to understand the effect of the two major printing parameters, voltage and pressure, on the feature resolutions. Images from Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) confirms the near perfect spherical shape of printed particles after curing, and magnetic tests showed a strong magnetic responsiveness from the printed particles. These findings demonstrated the potential of producing micro spherical composite particles with this novel embedded EHD printing approach, providing an important insight towards manufacturing of soft robotics, adaptive sensors, and targeted microsystems.

Magnetic-movement_testing.mp4 (7867 kB)
Magnetic-movement testing

Available for download on Tuesday, March 02, 2027

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